Titles - personal

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There are several contexts in which students might find the word title without being quite clear what it means. For some of these, see title. This is about the titles that are given to people in UK society.

  • If you are asked to fill in your title in a form, it means such names, or descriptions or labels, as Mr for a man, and Miss, Mrs or Ms for a woman. (For a complication involving women's titles, click here; for some advice on punctuation, click here.) Other such titles include Dr and Professor.
  • In studying History or Literature, you may want to know about "people of title" - the aristocracy; the upper classes. These are the people of privilege who have been ennobled for services to the state. They have titles that allow them some respect and privileged treatment. In the UK Parliament, members of this group used to sit by right of their birth in the House of Lords. There is a List of the different levels of the peerage here.
  • A title may also be the 'label' attached to a particular job or position. The title of the Head of the USA is that of President, and this title is held by whoever won the last election to the position. (All living predecessors are usually accorded the courtesy title of "Mr President".)